In 1768 the General Court passed An Act to regulate the trial of slaves for murder and other crimes and to repeal so much of an act, &c.  Sections one and two provided for the trial of slaves by the ordinary higher criminal courts.  Section three provided that the expenses incurred in the execution of slaves should be levied upon all the owners of able-bodied slaves in the county, by order of the justices presiding at the trial.  Section four repealed sections four, five, six, and seven of the Act of 1713.  This was significant.  It portended a better feeling toward the Negroes, and illumined the dark horizon of slavery with the distant light of hope.  A strong feeling in favor of better treatment for Negro slaves made itself manifest at this time.  When the Quaker found the prejudice against himself subsiding, he turned, like a good Samaritan, to pour the wine of human sympathy into the lacerated feelings of the Negro.  Private instruction was given to them in many parts of Jersey.  The gospel was expounded to them in its beauty and simplicity, and produced its good fruit in better lives.

The next year, 1769, a mercenary spirit inspired and secured the passage of another Act levying a tax upon imported slaves, and requiring persons manumitting slaves to give better securities.  It reads,—­

“Whereas duties on the importation of negroes in several of the neighboring colonies hath, on experience, been found beneficial in the introduction of sober industrious foreigners, to settle under his Majesty’s allegiance, and the promoting a spirit of industry among the inhabitants in general, in order therefore to promote the same good designs in this government and that such as purchase slaves may contribute some equitable proportion of the public burdens."[480]

How an impost-tax upon imported slaves would be “beneficial in the introduction of sober industrious foreigners,” is not easily perceived; and how it would promote “a spirit of industry among the inhabitants in general,” is a problem most difficult of solution.  But these were the lofty reasons that inspired the General Court to seek to fill the coffers of the Province with money drawn from the slave-lottery, where human beings were raffled off to the highest bidders in the colony.  The cautious language in which the Act was couched indicated the sensitive state of the public conscience on slavery at that time.  They were afraid to tell the truth.  They did not dare to say to the people:  We propose to repair the streets of your towns, the public roads, and lighten the burden of taxation, by saying to men-stealers, we will allow you to sell your cargoes of slaves into this colony provided you share the spoils of your superlative crime!  No, they had to tell the people that the introduction of Negro slaves, upon whom there was a tax, would entice sober and industrious white people to come among them, and would quicken the entire Province with a spirit of thrift never before witnessed!